Wireless devices have become extremely common place. They enable users unrestricted movement while still maintaining communications through a variety of means. Some devices utilize long-range communications such as satellite or wireless telephone technologies. Others employ shorter range communications such as Bluetooth devices. Although shorter range communications may at first appear to be a disadvantage, they actually allow better discrimination between the sender and receiver. For example, Bluetooth devices can be limited to 30 to 60 foot areas of communication. This drastically reduces interference with other users. Unfortunately, Bluetooth technology requires ‘discovery’ by a device in order to find other Bluetooth sources. In meeting environments where there are many users, a Bluetooth discovery session may uncover multiple users and devices with very similar identification tags. This makes it hard for a user to discriminate as to which users or devices they would like to connect with.
Near field communications (NFC) have been developed to eliminate some of the inconveniences of current communication technologies while allowing fast, secure connections of devices in close proximity. The European Computer Manufacturer's Association (ECMA) has developed a standard for near field communications, NFCIP-1 (ECMA-340, ISO/IEC 18092) Near Field Communication Interface and Protocol. These standards will help guide manufacturers in developing NFC compatible devices. One of the main advantages of NFC is that two devices can automatically create a communication link when they are brought into close proximity of each other. This enables information to be quickly shared between the devices. For example, in meetings, business card information can be easily shared by bringing NFC devices next to each other. The proximity restrictions allow NFC devices to discriminate amongst other NFC devices to control the flow of information.
One of the disadvantages, however, of NFC is a tendency of manufacturers to lean towards developing new data exchange protocols just for emerging technologies. Creating new data formats and communication methods is costly and tends to isolate the new technology until a majority of the industry has adopted those methods. This inevitably leaves a few manufacturers who refuse to adopt and keep esoteric methods alive. Ultimately, the users pay the price for this discord with the manufacturers by having to learn how to coordinate NFC devices with different data exchange methodologies.